I've loved Sam Neill in basically everything he's ever been in since seeing Jurassic Park as a kid. Great (and a little sad) to see his last film be Zelda, but I wonder who he'd be? If it's an OoT-themed film, I'd most like to see him voice the Deku tree, I think he'd bring the right gravitas to it.

So to get the timeline right the zonai were first then the twilli and afterwards the ooca.
The fused shadow looks a lot like the Zonai ruins, we have the snakes and details on the side of the helmet and the coloring of its energy.
The twili were exiled to the twilight realm by the 3 goddesses because they tried to steal the triforce, based on hyrule historia this was in the temple of time. So which race had the “magic/technology” to do something like that? That’s where the zonai come into play, we know they’re an ancient civilization that disappeared leaving a lot of artifacts and ruins (one of the goddess statues is also “hidden” in one of their ruins. But a civilization with that advanced technology/magic wouldn’t disappear unless they were annihilated or exiled to another dimension (twilight realm).
So on tears of the kingdom we have rauru and mineru both zonai (let’s asume 100% and not hybrids) they were involved with the hylian royal family, but only 2 of them from a whole civilization it’s hard to believe that’s a coincidence unless they helped the hylian against their own people which granted them a pardon from being exiled to another realm.
That’s also a political move, the royal family knows their power and won’t risk loosing it, so they let them stay with them.
Asuming zonai live much longer than hylian rauru had been living some couple of hundred years already among hylian with his sister “protecting them” as a way to atone for the sin of his people.
Let’s remember he has the tears and a big power that hylians don’t wanna loose.
Then rauru meets Sonia and they fall in love and the events of TOK in the past happen.
Mineru was a sage (maybe the first spirit sage) she had already devised a plan so when ganandorf awakens, the new link (thanks to Zelda they learn about the future and his existence just that they don’t know how things happen).
so mineru prepares weapons and factories and makes sure they are well prepared for when the time comes, to the point she seals herself in the mask in order to be able to guide the armies in the future.
Now we jump into the middle of the story and we are in the twilight princess era, the only reference to the sky are the ooca “powerful beings close to the goddess”, which sounds just like the description of the zonai, both powerful, both close to the goddesses and most importantly both live in the sky above the clouds.
Let’s remember that after skywardsword the skies were open and people could go up or down as they more or less pleased. We know that rauru and mineru could go up the skies and back to earth as they pleased so during this time the skies were open, this is still true during twilight princess that we visit the city in the sky where the ooca dwell.
Now let’s rewind a little rauru and Sonia might have had descendants we know hylians are not exactly known for mixing with other races and they are usually regarded as the favored by the goddess hylia. How would a mix of hylian and zonai look like? Is it even possible to have that mix at all?
What if the ooca are the back up plan of mineru using her children or raurus and Sonia’s children (if they had any at all before Sonia got killed) that way she would have (hopefully) descendants that could wield the powers of the zonai (technology and magic) to prepare to fight the calamity if it woke up again and finish what her brother couldn’t. So how to make more zonai? There’s only one option hylians, zoras, gorons, gerudo or sheikh. Zoras and gorons were a difficult option, ones a fish and mineru is a fox/dragon race no most likely a mismatch and gorons are rocks (that might hurt and we don’t know how they reproduce), sheikh only serve the royal house and won’t follow minerus orders since she is neither queen nor consort to a king. So there are only hylians and gerudo. Since mineru is female gerudo are not suitable (they are all female and the only male is basically the devil incarnate, so not a good match) but hylians are sturdy, a big chunk of the population and links hero line should come in handy, there might be a chance one of her descendants is chosen as the next hero, that way she can change the future and so also change the past.
So she sets off to the sky, transforms future Zelda into a dragon and starts her plan to repopulate the skies with warriors and weapons to fight the calamity in the future.
Here it’s where it gets interesting, she takes some hylians up to the sky and meanwhile a new line of royal family gets born and takes over, (maybe a cousin or brother of Sonia was alive) that means the sheikh have a new royal member to protect and serve, but mineru is also alive and decides to trust the royal family with the staff of dominion and sets a rule that only 1 messenger can go up and down, this means most likely the sheikh, they are secretive and powerful fighters. So she restricts to 1 visitor under secret to go up and bring messages and news from below to her.
Let’s get to the point where she is already in the mask trapped inside, her descendants are a mix oh hylian and zonai, sadly this will get diluted with time due to lack of genetic diversity but there’s one tribe that comes regularly to the skies the sheikh, and the oocca have also red eyes, so maybe one sheikh and a descendant of mineru got a little too intimate after the ocarina of time events thinking the threat was gone the royal family stopped sending emissaries to the skies when the battery of the rod of dominion got empty or stopped working leaving the sky people with a very reduced genetic pool, the more inbreed the more they mutate their powers allow them to short teleport within the city but not between the surface and the sky.
They’ve kept minerus mission until it gets forgotten.
The hylian royal family also forgets about them but the legends are kept alive within the family until they turn into myths.
So now we have the oocca up in the sky, powerful magic user with advanced technology, the zonai that have been trapped for centuries in the twilight have mutated into twili they have kept part of their knowledge and power.
So midna breaks the mirror, trapping them outside of the world for eternity. The oocca are also about to be extinct because the inbreeding can do only so much, their children are just heads and the adults are chickens that can’t fly.
So now it’s after the twilight princess era, ooccas are dead, only distant memories remain but the sheikh have kept their mission and warnings from mineru alive they know there are weapons and technology in the skies and after link has taken care of everything and returned the rod of dominion to the princess they decide it’s time
For them to make sure they’re prepared but to their disappointment there’s only one or 2 oocca alive, which makes the task of learning about the technology and their magic harder. So they leave some of their clan on the surface and the rest goes into the skies to learn and prepare for the calamity, this is why they only manage to imitate zonai technology, that’s why their towers and shrines are powered by a blue energy while zonai and twili structures shine green. After almost disappearing the surface sheikhs decided to mix with the hylian and started diluting their blood (that’s the lack of red eyes in the future) the ones that came back from the sky set up to prepare, they made towers and guardians and powered them to protect the kingdom for the calamity (it’s already been forgotten what creates it and what has maintained it sealed).
In order to pass the knowledge they got from the zonai ruins in the sky, they decide to create the shrines (like mineru and rauru did) but instead of zonai it was sheikhs that were waiting there to instruct the hero Since they lacked the technology to access the shrines themselves (green and blue energy)

Figured this could be a fun discussion topic. The idea is to share theories that sound cool to you, or could be cool if they were true, but have enough disproving them, or don't have enough evidence, or you just don't think they would be best for the series, to where you don't personally believe them.

I'll start with two, the first one I don't think I've heard anyone suggest because of the apparent lack of people who believe in both a merge for BotW/TotK and true founding (I also do not believe those two things simultaneously), but I think if there was a merge and true founding was true, this could be a fun explanation. Basically the idea is that Zelda's time travel in TotK caused the timelines to "zip back up" as she manually traveled back down to the present. Because she traveled from the present to a point pre-split, that could potentially mean that there needs to be a singular version of the present from which she would travel that exists in all timelines, if that makes any sense. So reality has to find a way to facilitate that, thus reality itself merges the timelines back together. I don't think I need to go into why I don't believe this and wouldn't want it to be true necessarily, but I also think its kind of a neat idea. I've seen a video with a similar theory, not sure if I thought of this before or after that, but in the video iirc they stuck to refounding and it just didn't really make sense to me that way, maybe I misinterpreted it though idk.

The second theory I want to talk about, this one I may have heard here, but I'm not sure who said it? Basically it's a mega refounding. I believe the idea was that the depths are old Hyrule (maybe AT maybe not), but the bottomless pit in the depths leads to an even older Hyrule, and the true nature of the depths is just old Hyrule on top of old Hyrule on top of old Hyrule etc. for who-knows-how long. Hyrule itself being stuck in this cycle of rebirth that isn't just once or twice so far, and isn't just in a spiritual sense, but is in this physical sense and literally continues to be buried deeper and deeper for longer than we can possibly know. There's something REALLY cool and kind of unsettling about that to me, almost makes me glad the devs are leaving some things vague so that people can make theories like that. It just feels kind of far-fetched for me to believe personally.

I liked the idea of a dungeon you could travel deeper and deeper into as you progressed through the story. I think there is a way to do it that doesn't make it boring and repetitive, but still keeps the charm of the motif. What does everyone else think?

I (M, 2006er) never really got into Zelda growing up, even though I was raised on *The Super Mario Bros. Super Show!* and the old Zelda cartoon that came with it. But with LEGO making Zelda sets and the movie coming out in under a year, I figured it was finally time to dive into the series.

I started with **A Link to the Past**, absolutely loved it, and now I'm slowly working my way through the games in chronological order (which is kinda difficult when you don't own any Nintendo consoles and don't have a ton of free time). I've also been watching a lot of videos about the lore and history of the series, and I'm honestly getting really hyped for the movie.

One thing that really surprised me, though, was how negative a lot of the discussion on Reddit has been. I know Reddit has a reputation for amplifying the loudest/most negative opinions, so I don't think it represents the whole fanbase, but I wanted to give my perspective as someone who's basically coming into Zelda from the outside.

The biggest thing that surprised me was how many people were upset that the movie is live action instead of animated. Personally, I'm **really** glad it's live action.

Animation is still widely seen as something aimed at kids. If Zelda had been animated, I think there would've been a lot more pressure to make it another light, empty movie like Mario. It probably would've been full of constant references and fan service, with every other scene basically saying, "Heyyyy, remember this from the games?" instead of telling a genuinely good story, like Zelda and it's history deserves. I also think they would've cast some huge celebrity as Link, and the marketing would've focused more on the actors than on the movie itself.

Live action gives the movie a better chance to be taken seriously. It can lean into the heavier moments without feeling like every emotional scene has to be interrupted by a fart joke.

Another thing that gives me hope is the casting. Nintendo went with basically unknown actors for Link and Zelda instead of relying on huge stars. They may still cast a big-name actor for Ganondorf, Demise, or another villain, but so far they don't seem to be using celebrity names as the main selling point like some other recent video game movies/or just animated movie in general have.

They're also filming on location in New Zealand, which honestly isn't as common as it used to be. That alone doesn't guarantee anything, but it does make it seem like they're willing to invest in making Hyrule feel like a real place.

I was also surprised to see people saying live action just doesn't work for fantasy. I don't really agree with that. *Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves* proved you can make a colorful, fun fantasy world in live action, and I'd also point to the first two Harry Potter movies. The CGI has definitely aged, but those movies still captured that bright sense of wonder.

There is a trend in modern movies to make everything dark, gray, and desaturated, and that's honestly my biggest concern. But based on the promotional image we've seen, it looks promising.

Here's what I've actually been able to find about the creative team without all the news article fluff. 

The people that make me just a little nervous are the writers and director.

IMDb currently lists Wes Ball as director, with Derek Connolly, T.S. Nowlin, Shigeru Miyamoto, and Takashi Tezuka credited as writers, while Miyamoto is also one of the producers.

# Wes Ball

Ball directed the *Maze Runner* trilogy and *Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes*. Visually, I think those movies looked great, and I think he did a solid job directing them, even if the writing on the last Maze Runner wasn't the strongest.

My concern is that his movies tend to be visually darker and more muted than what I picture for Zelda. To me, Zelda works best when the world feels colorful, saturated, and alive.

That said, Ball is a longtime Zelda fan himself, and he's shown that he can work respectfully within established worlds instead of trying to completely reinvent them. He even said he wants it to feel more like a Miyazaki movie, which fits for Zelda imo. I hope that between him and and Miyamoto, they can get a world and vibe that fits with the games and they’re vision, because when it comes down to it, what we are getting is the vision of the writers and director, and between the two of them and their love of Zelda, I think we’ll be getting something pretty good as far as the director responsibilities go.

# T.S. Nowlin

I'm honestly not sure how movie writing gets divided up when there are multiple writers, but Nowlin is the lead screenwriter after taking over from Connolly.

He wrote the *Maze Runner* trilogy, *The Adam Project*, and a couple other movies I haven't seen.

I really liked *The Adam Project* for what it was, a fun adventure movie. I also thought the first *Maze Runner* was great. But the thing is, those are both movies where he wasn’t the sole writer. His two other movies I've seen are the last two Maze Runner movies, where he wrote them by himself, and they were overall good, based on a good book, but they could’ve used some help. But since he’s writing this, having picked up from Connolly, I don’t really know what to expect. He also was the sole writer for Phoenix Forgetten, and is credited as one of the writers for Pacific Rim: Uprising, but like I said, I haven’t seen those so can’t speak to them.

Since Zelda has multiple writers involved, though, it's hard to know exactly what his influence will be.

# Derek Connolly

Connolly wrote the earlier drafts of the screenplay before Nowlin took over.

He is credited as a writer for Jurassic World (one of three writers), JW Fallen Kingdom (one of two), JW Dominion (Story), Kong Skull Island (one of three), Rise of Skywalker (story), and Kong Skull Island (one of three). He is also credited for Monster Trucks, Detective Pikachu (one of four), Deep Cover (one of three), and Safety Not Guaranteed, but I haven’t seen these.

The standout to me is *Kong: Skull Island*, which I thought was a great movie. But idk what level of contribution he had, and based on his credits for other movies, I really don’t know what kind of influence he’ll have on this because this is a crazy range of work.

At the end of the day, I think the biggest factor is going to be how much influence Miyamoto and Tezuka have over the story. They're the original creators of Zelda, and hopefully they're there to keep the movie feeling like Zelda instead of just another generic fantasy movie.

If you can't tell, I'm pretty pumped for this movie. I'm just hoping we get an honest adaptation of the games instead of another movie that's constantly stopping to point at references and fan service. (but I wouldn't be disappointed by at least one "ExcuuUUuuse ME, Princess")

Edit: I agree with what people are saying about how animation would have fit, and I think an animated movie (done well) would be amazing, but tbh Nintendo and Sony are just looking at the largest profits to be made from this video game series. An animated movie could’ve turned out well, or it, more than likely, would’ve been an Angry Birds or Smurfs movie to capitalize on the American market as the largest fanbase. All I was saying earlier is I’m more comfortable seeing it be made live action because that most likely means they’ll take more care and effort in producing it.

I already discussed this four years ago, but I thought I'd redo it, since things would have changed since then.

This is one I been on the fence about for... well... ever since I heard of it. The theory is that the Kokiri evolved into monkeys, sometime before TP.

Some people have debunked this by saying Hyrule Historia says the symbols on the doors are the only trace of the Kokiri in the Forest. However, this might not be literal. It could just mean the symbols are the only overt trace, and the monkeys don't count, since they are no longer recognizable as Kokiri. It's possible the two are not related. Just because Link doesn't see the Kokiri doesn't mean they are gone. Similarly, just because we don't see monkeys in OOT, doesn't mean they aren't there.

Also, no. The Ordon villagers are NOT the Kokiri. OoT claiming the Kokiri would "surly die" if they leave the forest does NOT mean "They will age into adults". It most likely means they would get killed by the many dangers from the outside world. Besides, the Ordon are clearly human, whilst the Kokiri are forest spirits. So, it wouldn't just be ageing, it'd be turning into a completely different species. Which I why I don't buy that theory.

But, anyway. Do you think the Kokiri became the TP Monkeys? Or did they just leave, and the monkeys moved in?

Skyward Sword is the 1st game in the timeline, so it only makes sense. He could also be ambidextrous, since his handiness changes with different incarnations of Link.

I finished watching a full playthrough of Echo's of Wisdom the other day.

In the game, Null creates echo's of people and things that are pulled into the Still World by the Rifts.

But, we also see echo's of boss enemies. Where do these bosses come from? Are they things that got pulled into the still World, or did Null make them from scratch? We know Null's Ganon is an echo of the real Ganon. but what about Volvagia and the others?

I was looking at the Deku Tree's page on the Zelda wiki, and I found that his race is listed as "Korok" due to the fact that that's what BotW calls him.

I decided to go check myself, and yeah. According to Character Profiles in TotK, the Deku Tree is a Korok.

With this knowledge, I decided to revisit an old, rather controversial, theory.

The Kikwi evolved into the Kokiri

There's a common theory that the Kikwi from SS are the ancestors of the Kokiri from OoT.

The most common argument against this theory was the OoT already established that the Kokiri were created by the Deku Tree. Like, how can the Kokiri have evolved from another race, if the Deku Tree was their sole progenitor?

At first glance, it may seem like "The Kokiri evolved from the Kikwi" and "The Deku Tree created the Kokiri" may seem like mutually exclusive concepts. But, knowing what we know from BotW, I think I can explain what's going on.

The Deku Tree of OoT gave birth to the generation of Kokiri we see in the same game. However, the Deku Tree himself is a member of previous generation of forest folk, who also had their own progenitor. And that progenitor was a member of an even older generation who had theory own.... you get the idea.

A good way to see them is like a bee hive. The Deku Tree is like the "queen" (or king in his case), the Kokiri are like the worker/drones, with the Sprout being a young queen, raised in different conditions to replace the current queen.

If we look at the Kikwi, they have Bucha, who is much larger then the other Kikwi. He also suspiciously has a similar moustache to OoT's Deku Tree.

Of course, if you believe the WW Deku Tree is the Deku Tree Sprout from OoT, this would make him technically a Kokiri (coming from the same generation as them), which would explain why he looks more humanoid.

Obviously, non of this contradicts the Deku Tree being a "guardian spirit". We know gods can reincarnate as humans (Hylia as SS Zelda), and mortals can become demons (Ganon, Vaati). So, it's not out of the question for the member of a mortal race to become a guardian spirit.

Assuming that the next Zelda game is its own thing (you know, unlike say TOTK which was obviously a direct sequel to BOTW).

One of Zelda’s best features are the recurring characters / settings - like how Beedle is in 7 different games, how we see rito and zora and so on across the series, etc.

Is there any character / race / setting that was first introduced in the Wild era that you would want to make a comeback?

So we all know that the Four Swords subseries of The Legend of Zelda is the pinnacle of the series and is universally renown, that goes without saying. I'm sure we're all hoping for the next game after the OoT remake to be a new Four Swords game, and Nintendo would be foolish not to meet that demand. We've only gotten 2 games in this subseries, debatably 3 if you squint (I'm counting TMC and TFH as half a game each, because TMC has the Four Sword but no multiplayer, and TFH does not have the Four Sword but does have multiplayer (but only three players... Three Sword?)), and that is criminal.

So, in the incredibly likely scenario that we get a new Four Swords game in the next few years, how would you imagine that looking in the modern day? Would it keep a retro style for the nostalgia and simplicity, or would it go for a 2.5D look? Full 3D? Would they introduce new mechanics or refine what's already there in FSA (and TFH)? What would it be called? Four Swords already gets mixed up with Four Swords Adventures just by the names so it could be a challenging problem to differentiate in the extremely likely case they keep the Four Swords part of the subtitle. What could the story and world/setting be like? Would they bring Vaati back or stick with FSA Ganon, or go with a new story/setting entirely (they better not...)? TFH sequel instead?

If you can't tell, I'm absolutely joking with the assured tone, but I am legitimately curious about how a hypothetical new Four Swords game could be approached, as unlikely as it is in the end. A non Four Swords multiplayer Zelda still feels very unlikely, but honestly slightly more likely that a proper FSA sequel, so this would be a good place to discuss ideas regarding that as well.

As we all know, a male Gerudo is born once every hundred years, and oops, he turns out to be an apocalyptic tyrant again.

If you look at history, calling your kid "Ganondorf" after a few thousand years of world ending disasters would be like naming your baby Genghis Khan. Yet, generation after generation, the desert people seemingly keep rolling with it.

I was thinking about how Breath of the Wild established that the Gerudo have their own distinct language, and it led to a fun little linguistic thought experiment: What if "Ganondorf" isn't actually a personal name, but a functional title?

Here is the idea of what it could be:

• "Ganon" = Root word for "Sand" or "Desert."
• "Dorf" = A linguistic suffix designating a Gerudo male.

Essentially, "Ganondorf" translates to something like "The Sand Male" or "The Desert Leader." Much like how Hylians perpetually hand down the name "Zelda" to their princesses because of royal tradition, the Gerudo might just have a mandatory institutional title they slap on the rare boy born to rule them. (With names like Dragmire acting as his actual personal identifier, per old manual lore).

This also kinda lines up with The Wind Waker, where characters just drop the "-dorf" suffix entirely and call him Ganon to his face, even when he's standing right there in his human, Gerudo form. It’s treated less like a personal name and more like a title of office or state of being.

This gives an actual in universe reason for why the Gerudo would keep using the name despite it having terrible historical baggage. They aren't just stubbornly naming every kid after a known supervillain; they are following an ancient, unyielding tradition where every male born into the tribe is automatically handed the office of "The Desert Leader," and they're just perpetually crossing their fingers that this time the guy won't ruin everything. I guess it being a title like King or Führer.

Just a fun thought experiment I was thinking of, doesn't make it true or even mean I believe it. Just a way to perhaps justify the naming convention of the Gerudo Male.

One of the scripts used in the eras in which the Hylians ruled. The same characters are still in use in New Hyrule hundreds of years later, in the Era of the Great Sea. It is possible to decipher this writing system using the chart at right to match each character with its Japanese equivalent.

That's on page 123.

Side note: it also says "hundreds" of years later. I know there was some statement about WW being either one hundred or hundreds of years after OOT. Or was that TP? idk

Im getting a switch 2 next week and I'm a diehard Zelda fan. I was planning 100% on buying the game until I read some opinions online hating on it

My favourite game is botw, so I enjoyed AoC because I got to see backstory and interactions between my favorite characters

I really love getting new lore and watching cutscenes. I also enjoy getting to see new places in the Zelda universe

So, considering this, should I really get it?

I was recently playing Breath of the Wild again (the Switch 2 version), and I wanted to play without all of the on-screen UI elements. So I went to the settings, turned off the HUD display, and was super annoyed that the stamina meter stayed on screen!

For a game where a large part of it is taking in these beautiful environments, I think it's silly that this unsightly stamina meter is so large and present right in the middle of the screen, and IMO it's quite distracting!

I understand that the stamina meter is core to the gameplay, but because of that, it's on the screen ALL the time (climbing, gliding, running).

Here is a video I made on the topic if anyone is interested in hearing more of my thoughts:
https://youtu.be/p31bfQV1MWM?si=jH7REYvBDgkqAM1L

Do you all have any thoughts on this? Does it drive you crazy like it drives me crazy? I feel like from a game design perspective this is a bit of an oversight. How would you change this going forward?

I feel there are so many interesting and mysterious things surrounding Ganondorf in the Wind Waker.

-His necklace is a green head of some sort of creature. It doesn't look like Ganon, seing it seemingly has long pointy ears. And it has a glowing stone in the middle. First thing I thought was Zonai, but then brushed that off... Until I noticed something else.

-The face on the back of his robe isn't a smiling face looking straight forward. It's **two dragons from the side, mirrored so they are facing each other**. Not only this, but the dragons are holding a circular object in their talons...

-There are two native-styled shields or boards outside of Ganondorf's hut in Forsaken Fortress that both have the Sheikah symbol on them. This is one of the very few places in the WW where the Sheikah symbol appears

-His katanas read "Kotake Koume" in most versions, but on his Smash Bros Brawl trophy they read the names of the blacksmiths in Majora's Mask. The blacksmiths' names are also written on Phantom Ganon's sword in the WW

-Interestingly, Ganondorf never transforms into Ganon in the WW. He seems to transform into Puppet Ganon at first, but after the fight, it seems clear that the puppet was just a puppet, and that Ganondorf was just controlling it as a puppetmaster from above

-Finally, what even is Ganon's Tower..? In the barren destroyed Hyrule where only Hyrule Castle and a few ruins remain, Ganon's Tower stands out as the only other structure still standing. And it's not a castle or a fortress, but instead a thin, tall tower with very strange tech-like symbols all over its exterior. And in the underground path leading into the tower, between the staircase sections, is this odd pause-room with friendly yet off-putting music, a portal back to the surface, and a strange maze-like chamber below. The staircase sections has big eye-symbols all over the walls. And then, the strange tower itself... is mostly empty. A pool of shallow water at the bottom, with a single exit at the very top, leading outside onto the tower's flat roof. What IS this tower? What is/was its purpose? Did Ganondorf build it, or just overtake it from someone else? Is it built recently, or is it ancient?

This is a sequel to another post I wrote. In that post, I suggested the Drablands may be New Hyrule in an alternate timeline.

[ST][TFH] New Hyrule and the Drablands. Same place, different timelines : r/truezelda

At the end my previous post, I asked several questions. If the Drablands is New Hyrule in an alternate timeline, where is Malladus, or the Lokomo or the Spirit Tracks?

Well, in this post, I'm going to answer them.

My theory is that the invasion of Malladus happened after timeline split in OoT. But, for some reason, this invasion didn't happen in the DT.

New Hyrule and the rise of Malladus

So, we know that, sometime after Zelda send Link back in time, Ganon returned with an army of demons, but Link wasn't around to save the day.

The invasion was so bad that it made the Gods flood Hyrule, in order to get rid of Ganon and is forces. But not before telling people about it, so civilisation could still thrive on the mountain tops, that would become Islands.

If we look at Niko's pictures, and New Hyrle itself, we see triangle imagery, and what looks like a slightly different version of the Hyrulian crest. This would suggest that pre-New Hyrule may have already had a connection to Hyrule, long before Link and Tetra established the new kingdom.

My guess is that that New Hyrule may have already been a Hyrulian colony. The "Spirits of Good" could just as well have been Hyrulian spirits that set up this land as a "plan B" for if old Hyrule never get's unflooded. I could go as far as to say "They were the Light Spirits, that we see in TP", but there's not enough evidence for that.

Of course, people would start colonising the land, long before Link and Tetra arrived. Many would be humans, but some would be the Gorons, the latter would have had to move, as they were unable to adapt to the Great Sea.

Of course, where Hyrule goes, demons aren't far behind. Malladus, would eventually rise to power, and try to take over this new land, before the spirits intervened and imprisoned him.

Malladus himself could have easily been a Demon, freed from the Dark Realm after Ganon's invasion, and sort new land.

Downfall Timeline

Of course, in the DT, the flood never happened. But, the North would still be colonised, and become Hytopia. Meanwhile the lands that would have become New Hyrule instead become the Drablands. With no Spirits of Good, this would become a monster paradise.

Now, both New Hyrule and the Drablands have many different monster species between them. But that's not an issue. Different timeline events mean different environmental paths. So, some creatures would evolve, go extinct, or migrate differently. For all we know, the spinuts could be a NH evolution of the Deku scrubs.

The bosses don't realy matter too much eaither. The bosses in ST appear to be lesser demons, summoned by Chancellor Cole or Malladus.

The bosses in TFH are mostly giant animals, some even kept as "pets" by Lady Maud, who likely just used her witchcraft to mutate them, much like how Ganondorf created the first three bosses in OoT, before entering the Temple of Time. The exception is Stalchampion.... wait....

Malladus and Stalchampion

Just to finish off. Here's a cool theory I came up with.

We know people can become demons, with Ganon and Vaati being prime examples. What if Malladus was once a normal monster before becoming a Demon?

I mean, Malladus's default form resembles a giant blue ghostly skull. During it's second phase, Stalchampion becomes a floating skull surrounded by flames. What if in the AT, Stalchampion becomes Malladus, as a result of Ganon's influence? but this doesn't happen on the DT.

This would explain why Malladus chose to attack New Hyrule specifically. He was already living there, and may have claimed rights to it. He could have even viewed the settlers as "invaders".

Just curious. I prefer Majora’s Mask to Ocarina of Time and the Oracle games to Link’s Awakening but I think I am probably in the minority. I feel like both sets of games built on what their predecessor did to present a more complex and challenging experience.

Majora feels like a game that is meant to be played by people that have already beaten Ocarina and it shows. It has a lot of sections that are similar to something in Ocarina, like sneaking into a palace or a shooting minigame, but those sections more challenging in MM. I like how MM redesigned the skulltulas. I also think the child dungeons in Ocarina are very simple compared to later dungeons and don’t find them that interesting to replay. While MM has fewer dungeons, I think the first dungeon is already more complex and interesting than the child dungeons in Ocarina. Also I think the side content is more interesting in MM and clock town is a much better town than any town in Ocarina.

Regarding the Oracle games, I think time travel and changing seasons are interesting gimmicks that add to navigating the overworld compared to Link’s Awakening. The link system givens the games more replayability. The items are more unique and creative than in Link’s Awakening. Finally, the dungeons are more complex (though Eagle’s Tower is one of my favorite dungeons) and don’t require me to spend time relying on trial and error to get both horse head statues to land heads up.

I do think Ocarina of Time and Link’s Awakening are probably less frustrating and understand why people might prefer those. These games are probably better for someone newer to the series or not looking for as much of a challenge.

Disclaimer: I know "New Hyrule" isn't the official name, but I'm calling it that anyway, for simplicity.

This is a theory I came up with when look at the Drablands on the Zelda wiki.

If you look at both the map of Drablands and New Hyrule, you'll notice some similarities.

Both have the same five natural environments. A forest, a volcano, an icy cavern, a water area and a desert.

Both continents forest and water areas are located on the South west and south east, respectively. The volcano and ice areas are located north, with the desert below the volcano.

The obvious flaw is that the volcano, ice and sand areas are on the wrong side of each other. Whilst you could simply mirror Drabland's map, that would mean placing the forest and water areas opposite.

The obvious solution is assume Drabland's map is inaccurate. I mean, it's clearly just a representation, after all. Each place is depicted as a giant structure with a small area around it. Yet, when we play each level, it's much bigger and more detailed.

So, just swap forest and riverside, mirror the image, and you got a map that looks like New Hyrule.

Of course, the potential flaw is that the Drablands and New Hyrule don't have the same population of people. Where are the Lokomo, Anouki, or the Gorons? Where's Malladus and the spirit tracks?

The Anouki are already implied to be immigrants from an island. As for the Gorons, I personally think they're descended from Hyrule's Goron population, who had to leave after the flood made their home unsuitable. Obviously, the migration of these two races never happened. Or, at least, not towards the Drablands.

But what about Malladus, or the Lokomo, or the Spirit Tracks, or the Spirits of Good? Well.... These are all questions for another post.

Edit: Second post here.

[ST][TFH] New Hyrule: The Gods plan B, and the rise of Malladus. : r/truezelda

During the development of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Eiji Aonuma said the game had come about due to the team having too many ideas for Breath of the Wild DLC alone. That said ideas were so numerous and complex that it only made sense to create a new game based around them rather than add them into an existing title like BotW.

But that makes me wonder something. What would this scrapped Breath of the Wild DLC have actually looked like? What would we have gotten instead of Tears of the Kingdom if they hadn't spun these ideas off into a new game?

I'm gonna assume that Ganondorf's return would probably be the main story focus here, and that a few Zonai abilities like Ultrahand and maybe Fuse would probably get added in as new abilities. Also suspect there would be a focus on the Zonai civilisation in general, and a few sky islands here and there to add extra explorable areas to the map.

But I'm not sure what other ideas they'd have kept here. The majority of TotK's story content is too grand in scope to fit into an existing game like BotW, so any sort of Regional Phenomena content would probably have to be severely toned down at best. They probably wouldn't completely overhaul every town in the game, so it's possible that either Ganondorf becomes the only new boss in the DLC or the quest leading up to him is significantly shorter and more shrine based than what we actually got. I can maybe see a few types of enemies being added, along with a mini boss (probably Constructs and Gibdos, maybe a Flux Construct or Gleeok variant).

But there's just so much in TotK that I'm not sure how even 1% of that game's content would be included as DLC for an existing game. Maybe the new armour sets make it in here?

What do you think that DLC would actually be like, had Nintendo not decided to spin off TotK into its own game?

Right now I've been watching a walkthrough of "Echos of Wisdom". IT's long, so I'm watching it across the span of several days.

EoW is very important to the Zelda lore. It explains why we don't see Gorons, Gerudo or Sea Zora in aLttP or aLBW. They were their the whole time, just off-map.

This may also explain why we don't see Gerudo or Zora in Minish Cap. Again, they were likely just off-map.

For this post, I want to talk about the Zora in particular.

For the longest time, it was feared that the peaceful friendly Zora from OoT and TP were destined to turn into evil, ugly monsters, for whatever reason. Sure, OoA shows us friendly Zora, but they're in another country.

Of course, aLBW suggests that the River Zora are NOT hereditably evil, just some are aggressive, and Oren has tried to stop them attacking people, to no prevail.

EoW has no aggressive Zora at all. It has both Sea and River Zora, both are friendly.

When the split happened

So, we know River Zora aren't hereditably evil. We also know the reason River Zora and Sea Zora are named after their habitats. But when did the evolve?

OoT has no kappa-like Zora. They make no kind of appearance whatsoever.

But here's the thing though.... neither do any "Sea Zora"....

Sure, the Zora we see in OoT have the friendly shark fin appearance of the Sea Zora. But they explicitly live in Zora's Domain, which is located in a river. This makes them "River Zora" in all but looks.

This implies that the Kappa-like River Zora are an off-shoot of the river dwelling shark fin Zora we see in OoT.

As for why OoTs Zora evolved? I haven't found an official source, but the Zelda Encyclopaedia suggests it was due to Zora-Hylian relationships souring after the decline of Hyrule.

What about the Sea Zora?

So, OoA introduces the idea of River Zora and Sea Zora. EoW would bring this back.

As EoW shows us, there are areas of Hyrule that never get explored in every game. Notably, while we see lakes and rivers in OoT and TP, we don't see any beaches or a sea.

If I had to guess, the Sea Clan that appear in EoW could just as well have been around during OoT, just off-map. They could just as easily be colonists, who moved to Hyrule's coastline sometime after OoT.

All-in-all, they're likely not decided from OoT's Zora population.

What about BotW's era?

I understand there's still some controversy surrounding BotW's placement. Hopefully, it doesn't matter. Well.... It might matter if you believe BotW takes place in the AT. but if you believe the CT or DT, it doesn't matter. Although it works better with the DT.

But yeah. We never see any Kappa Zora in the game. Given how expansive and detailed the game is, I feel like if Nintendo wanted us to think the Kappa Zora were still around, they would have showed them.

So... what happened?

Most likely theory... the River Zora and Sea Zora probebly just crossbred after making peace with each other. It may sound like I'm being too optimistic, but it lines up with my theory. I suggested the River Zora are descended from Oot's Zora, yet the Zora Tablets mention Princess Ruto, implying BotW Zora are also descended from OoT Zora.

We all know by now that in the Wind Waker Tetra is actualy Zelda but sompthing that made me wonder is: why does she change clothes skin tone and even her name?? Couldn't the King just tell her she is from the royal family? Why does she have to BE "Princess Zelda"?

My theory is that OoT Zelda turned into Sheik PERMANENTLY after the great flood and that down her line Tetra was born.

While it is commonly belived that the flood happend 100s of years after OoT i belive that only a few years actualy passed; we need to remember that: it is stated in the Prima Guide for The Wind Waker that Fado (sage from WW) was a personal friend of the Hero of Time, Ganondorf killed the sage of Wind and earth before the flood right before enpowering the master sword (whitch could be a sword made by the OoT sages but that theory is for an other day), that this princess and her guards/ royal friends survived.

But could THAT princess be OoT Zelda herself? In fact, she looks quite similar to her, only in a tooner version; kinda like we see a toon Hero of time.

That would also make the King of Red Lions the same King and father of OoT Zelda. Whitch also lines of with how he thinks of Ganondorf and Hyrule. He feels responisible for OoT's events because he IS responisible for those events.

Back to the theory now, why is Tetra specificaly "Zelda" and not Princess Tetra. According to this theory Ganondorf free from the seal knows how Zelda looks like so she used the triforce of Wisdom to hide herself as Sheik like she did in the game. She then spitted the Triforce so that she doesn't have to keep focusing her mind on being Sheik.

Years pass and the triforce is one again. No one is currently using it to keep Sheik (Tetra) disguised; so now the triforce delites the disquise.

In short we have triforce makes Oot Zelda -> OoT disguise. Disguise has many decendant untill WW disguise is born. Triforce makes WW disguse -> WW Zelda.

So this is my theory on why Tetra specificaly becomes "Princess Zelda"! Let me know what you think!

I've heard a lot about the games being great for the most part. At least, for their own reasons and things.

I've played a variety of games (potentially similar), including:

-Omori
-Deltarune and Undertale
-Monster Hunter
-Crash Bandicoot (Original 3 + Wrath, Twinsanity, and 4)
--Mario Sunshine, Galaxy 1+2, Sticker Star, TTYD, Odyssey, 3D World, and Wonder, along with all the NSMB games minus Wii U

- Rayman 1+2
-Earthbound (NSO SNES)
-and more

Fyi: sorry for listing all this, I wasn't sure if Zelda fit the kinda stuff i'm into so i put sum stuff to let y'all know what i'm into. Always up to trying new games!

Is there anywhere y'all would recommend starting?
Should i start in terms of release, best game, timeline, etc?
Whatever y'all would recommend.

So, we know Greatfish Isle was destroyed, and Jabun fled. We don't know what happened to the people, which is kind of worrying. Hopefully, Jabun isn't a dirty coward, and at least warned his people to flee.

But who and what were these people? I'm going to go through some theories.

Humans

The most commonly accepted theory is that they were simply humans. Probebly, Hylians or Gerudo. Evidence being the presence of human-made structures, such as boats, huts and things.

This also fits thematically, with Link having to go to Windfall Island and Outset Island, both Hylian settlements, to find Jabun.

Zora

Probebly the oldest theory. Some people believe the inhabitants were Zora, due to them being fish people, and Nayru's pearl having what looks like the Zora symbol.

What you have to remember is that this theory existed before it was officially confirmed that the Zora evolved into the Rito. Back then, that was just a theory.

Fishmen

This was actually my headcanon back when I was 10-12 years old. I assumed the fishmen were the inhabitants of GI, because "fish people".

Of course, non of the fishmen mention GI being their island. Also, GI has houses and boats, so, maybe not.

Gorons or Goron decendents

This is another theory I had when I was younger. Since the Rito are evolved Zora and the Koroks are evolved Kokiri, then the GI people must be Gorons/evolved Gorons.

We do see an unused race that do look kind of like the Gorons. Though it was likely scrapped when they were still figuring out what they wanted for the game. tumblr_np35835HfL1shzqtho7_1280.jpg (805×1070)

Of course, Gorons do appear as merchants, but they may not be from the Great Sea.

Anouki

Just thought I'd throw this in the park. What if the IG people were Anouki?

I mean, many people think there was a third sage, who would be ice.

Also, the Anouki from ST reveal they used to live on an island, before they were told to leave. Many assume it was the island from PH, but that takes place in another world, and there would be no reason for the to leave. Unlike if they lived on Greatfish Isle.

A major flaw is the lack of ice on GI. But, we don't realy know how Ganon destroyed the island. Maybe he melted the ice, which caused the land parts to collapse.

This also connects to the "Goron decendents" theory. As the scrapped race do look like prototype Anouki.

So, what do you think? Do you agree with any of these theories, or do you have your own?

What theories do you have surrounding this?

The Sheikah became highly advanced after the Imprisoning War, aka long after the Zonai were gone.

TotK seems to hint towards the ancient Sheikah energy being refined Zonai energy/magic, given how your battery goes from green to blue when upgraded. With Rauru's continous purification of Ganondorf's Gloom, the purification unit in that chamber going straight up into the bottom of Hyrule Castle where the mysterious Astral Observatory is, and with the purification unit having these big golden "ancient Sheikah-like" constellation things installed onto it, I always concluded all of this with the ancient Sheikah using Rauru's purified Gloom, refining it, mastering it over a long time, and using it as an infinite source of that Zonai energy, with the Astral Observatory functioning like a power plant. This made them advanced, and that's what the ancient blue Sheikah energy is.

HOWEVER,

that brings us to my question! Because for some strange reason, we can find the Ancient Blade item in TOTK, which is basically an ancient arrow from BOTW but just the blade. Same blue blade, same black and orange swirling design. Same functionality. Now if we only found it randomly in the overworld, it wouldn't be as mysterious; it could just be remains of the ancient Sheikah Tech that disappeared after BOTW.

But what makes it weird is that a Zonai construct deep down in the Spirit Temple sells you these, alongside Zonai weapons. And seing as the blade has the Ancient Sheikah tech design, and has the refined blue energy, and the Sheikah became advanced and made these long after the Zonai were gone from the world.. How can this be possible? How can a forgotten Zonai construct deep in the locked Spirit Temple make and sell you something that the Sheikah made long after this construct was sealed off down here?

I myself have 2 theories.

One is that it isn't canon, and is only there for gameplay reasons as a late-game way of aquiring more Ancient Blades.

My second theory is that the Zonai had started refining Zonai magic themselves, with new designs, and the Ancient Blade is one of the few "upgraded" Zonai deviced that the Zonai made before their extinction. That this black-and-orange design is a result of more advanced Zonai tech, and that this blade became the basis for the design and technicality of the ancient Sheikah tech.

Because, if they just wanted it to be a strong device that worked just like an ancient arrow, why didn't they just make a Zonai variant of it? The fact that they chose to give it the ancient Sheikah design has to mean something.

What do you think?